It’s been a funny old year thus far for books – having for once not even kept a list, I’m struggling to remember what, if anything, I read while winter was still with us.
That wouldn’t be a first – it seems a sort of unofficial habit of mine: to start off slowly in January and pick up as the months pass.
Venice gave me a kick on the book front: after re-reading Thomas Mann’s Death in Venice for the umpteenth time, it was on to Donna Leon’s police procedurals set amid the canals and featuring Commissario Guido Brunetti.
So far, I’ve read Death at La Fenice, Death in a Strange Country, The Anonymous Venetian, A Venetian Reckoning and Acqua Alta.
They good fun; quite dark and a bit obsessed with the Mafia and corruption, but with a cast of main characters that are reasonably well drawn. They're hardly the apotheosis of the genre, but they're enjoyable for when I want something light, which doesn't tax "the little grey cells" too much.
And there are plenty more in the series, but given the speed at which I gobble them up, I’m keeping a couple for summer and the beach.
I have also managed a couple of Terry Pratchett’s Discworld novels – Monstrous Regiment and then Night Watch, both of which were as brilliant as one expects from Sir Tez, plus Gore Vidal’s Sexually Speaking: Collected Sex Writings, which was odd, since it had nowhere near the amount of sex I was hoping for, but was superb anyway and had me ordering another collection of Vidal’s essays straight away.
And then, as seen in yesterday’s review, Blake Morrison’s The Last Weekend.
That interrupted a re-read of Raymond Chandler’s The Big Sleep – and thank goodness I could return to that on Sunday evening.
Re-reads are intriguing. There aren’t many books I’ve read more than once – let alone more than that. I should take that as a lesson and I’d easily and quickly be able to cull my library. But Chandler, as with Mann, would be at no risk of eviction.
There have been other bits and pieces in the past few months – I can rarely read history in one go and have two tomes on the ‘reading-in-process’ pile at present.
But my mind is already turning to my reading list for Collioure at the end of August. We barely took enough last year and, since my new case (the old one had to be Sellotaped up on the way back from Venice) is bigger and lighter, it shouldn’t be a problem to ensure a nice variety this time.
On the more serious front, I’ve promised myself I’ll take Elizabeth David: A Biography by Lisa Chaney.
On something of a crime fiction kick, I’m tempted to try one of Andrea Camilleri’s Inspector Montalbano novels, which are set in Sicily, together with one of the Wallander novels by Henning Mankell, plus – as mentioned already – some more Donna Leon and inevitably, some Maigret.
I may pack the new collection of Vidal essays and possibly the first volume of Proust’s In Search of Lost Time, plus some poetry: I’m about two thirds of the way through Ted Hughes’s Tales from Ovid, which has finally conveyed to me the glories of Greek mythology – not least in actually getting me familiar with a few of the stories. On these grounds, I’m contemplating some more Hughes.
Such a selection should keep me going. At least for a few days!
Showing posts with label Donna Leon. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Donna Leon. Show all posts
Tuesday, 8 June 2010
Monday, 12 April 2010
Taking it home
Finally, after what seems to have been an endless series of false dawns, we had a weekend that really felt like spring – not just the first hints of spring, you understand, but the full-blown thing.
The weather permitted not only some much-needed gardening, but also the welcome opportunity to lounge around in the sun with a book for hours on both days – already there are the first signs of my tan reviving.
The park behind our flats was echoing with the sound of leather on willow on Saturday, and a stroll to and from the local picture framers revealed the sight of a full-blown cricket match; both teams in whites and even a proper boundary marked out. There have been plenty of knock-abouts over the years, but neither of us could recall being aware of such a proper game and, if anything screams that summer is on the way, it’s cricket.
The framed pictures were a batch from our trip, plus a poster I’d bought after visiting an exhibition of Irving Penn’s portrait photography at the National Portrait Gallery a few weeks ago. We’d managed to find some really excellent prints for diddly squat just around the corner from San Marco, right amidst the predictable souvenir dross.
Nino, the son of artist Baldan Fabio, sold them to us – one lithograph and three mixed media – explaining that his father used to be able to sell etchings for something like €350 in the same spot, but the increase in tourism (and tourist tat) had meant that that was no longer viable, so he’d changed the nature of his work and was charging less. A lot less. The pictures were absolute bargains.
Looking in gallery windows as we strolled, it was clear that he was at least as good as many of the other artists whose work was hung in more salubrious environments and was marked with concomitantly far higher prices. It seemed that he was in a sort of no man’s land between being able to afford a gallery space and having to stick with his little stand on the Fondamenta.
Nino seemed to decide that we were the sort of visitors who were worth talking to and, as he wrapped up our lithograph with enormous care (impressed that we had chosen a backstreet picture of a canal rather than the ‘obvious’ gondolas), explained to us that the indigenous population of Venice had shrunk, in recent decades, to around 59,000.
He said that there was a real danger of the city becoming simply a glorified theme park, and that politicians were more interested in the Venetian buildings than the Venetian people.
With a local election the day after, Nino told us that he would be voting for a party that backed the local people. He didn’t actually say which, but returned to the stall the next day to buy the mixed media, and he said he was just off to vote.
Most people who visit Venice apparently do so via coach tours – and they stay for, at most, a day. At one point, you could almost feel the city’s population swell as a massive (and I mean “massive”) cruise liner moored in the nearby port – and decrease when it sailed out of port.
For those who actually spend time in Venice, the average stay is apparently 2.5 nights. So at five nights, we were in some sort of quite serious category.
I’ll say at this point that I was quite ready to come home when we did – but that was primarily because I was in danger of some sort of overdose otherwise: I needed time to deal with all my thoughts and impressions. And because I wanted to see my cats again, of course.
But I found myself, quite quickly (if not earlier) wanting to bring home and utilise some (at least) of the lessons I’d learned.
It’s one thing to enjoy a cuisine in the country itself – but it’s quite another to take what you’ve discovered home and start using it in your own kitchen.
In a way, the most obvious thing about the food in Venice was the simplicity – which was a reminder of something I’ve understood for some time.
But the other thing that really struck me was seasoning – not least with lemon and herbs.
So how have I dealt with that?
Actually, it’s felt (thus far) ridiculously easy.
Tonight, for instance, I grilled lamb chops and served them with soft polenta and courgette. And, of course, lemon.
It was only the second time I’d attempted polenta – and was way better than the first. But perhaps that’s obvious? Now, I’ve had the experience of eating it in a country in which it is a standard part of the cuisine.
I infused the milk and water (500ml for two people) with bay leaves, sliced garlic and some parsley) before straining the liquid and then adding 100g of polenta (the quick cook stuff) to it. Some faint sticking occurred, but that was easily dealt with. I added a little butter and some olive oil and seasoning. And – a new lesson – I actually kept tasting.
The more I think about it, the more I come to understand that good cooking is not difficult. It IS an art – or at least, cook cooking reflects an appreciation of life that goes far beyond anything puritanical.
I wonder, sometimes, just how much those tourists who visit Venice (or Barcelona or Paris or Berlin or London) on buses, and spend a meagre few hours being told what to look at and how to look at it, actually ever get from their trips.
I am not a snob. The experiences of the Orient Express taught me (if I’d not realised it before) that money has little to do with appreciation. So I want everyone who can really gain from travel to be able to do so. But I think of what Nino said and I do wonder how much of all this tourism is worth it.
It’s a subject that crops up in Donna Leon’s Guido Brunetti novels.
Back in the UK, I was surfing Amazon – so often the source of unexpected information, if only indirectly. And I found this set of crime novels – 19 to date – set in Venice.
Leon is a US-born academic, who has lived and worked in Iran, China, Saudi Arabi and, subsequently, for 20 years, Venice.
Given a rather good Amazon offer, I ordered the first three books – and am already more than half way through the second. Which should tell you something about the first. I’ve now ordered the fourth to sixth.
It’s really not that difficult to take something of a city home with you after all.
The weather permitted not only some much-needed gardening, but also the welcome opportunity to lounge around in the sun with a book for hours on both days – already there are the first signs of my tan reviving.
The park behind our flats was echoing with the sound of leather on willow on Saturday, and a stroll to and from the local picture framers revealed the sight of a full-blown cricket match; both teams in whites and even a proper boundary marked out. There have been plenty of knock-abouts over the years, but neither of us could recall being aware of such a proper game and, if anything screams that summer is on the way, it’s cricket.
The framed pictures were a batch from our trip, plus a poster I’d bought after visiting an exhibition of Irving Penn’s portrait photography at the National Portrait Gallery a few weeks ago. We’d managed to find some really excellent prints for diddly squat just around the corner from San Marco, right amidst the predictable souvenir dross.
Nino, the son of artist Baldan Fabio, sold them to us – one lithograph and three mixed media – explaining that his father used to be able to sell etchings for something like €350 in the same spot, but the increase in tourism (and tourist tat) had meant that that was no longer viable, so he’d changed the nature of his work and was charging less. A lot less. The pictures were absolute bargains.
Looking in gallery windows as we strolled, it was clear that he was at least as good as many of the other artists whose work was hung in more salubrious environments and was marked with concomitantly far higher prices. It seemed that he was in a sort of no man’s land between being able to afford a gallery space and having to stick with his little stand on the Fondamenta.
Nino seemed to decide that we were the sort of visitors who were worth talking to and, as he wrapped up our lithograph with enormous care (impressed that we had chosen a backstreet picture of a canal rather than the ‘obvious’ gondolas), explained to us that the indigenous population of Venice had shrunk, in recent decades, to around 59,000.
He said that there was a real danger of the city becoming simply a glorified theme park, and that politicians were more interested in the Venetian buildings than the Venetian people.
With a local election the day after, Nino told us that he would be voting for a party that backed the local people. He didn’t actually say which, but returned to the stall the next day to buy the mixed media, and he said he was just off to vote.
Most people who visit Venice apparently do so via coach tours – and they stay for, at most, a day. At one point, you could almost feel the city’s population swell as a massive (and I mean “massive”) cruise liner moored in the nearby port – and decrease when it sailed out of port.
For those who actually spend time in Venice, the average stay is apparently 2.5 nights. So at five nights, we were in some sort of quite serious category.
I’ll say at this point that I was quite ready to come home when we did – but that was primarily because I was in danger of some sort of overdose otherwise: I needed time to deal with all my thoughts and impressions. And because I wanted to see my cats again, of course.
But I found myself, quite quickly (if not earlier) wanting to bring home and utilise some (at least) of the lessons I’d learned.
It’s one thing to enjoy a cuisine in the country itself – but it’s quite another to take what you’ve discovered home and start using it in your own kitchen.
In a way, the most obvious thing about the food in Venice was the simplicity – which was a reminder of something I’ve understood for some time.
But the other thing that really struck me was seasoning – not least with lemon and herbs.
So how have I dealt with that?
Actually, it’s felt (thus far) ridiculously easy.
Tonight, for instance, I grilled lamb chops and served them with soft polenta and courgette. And, of course, lemon.
It was only the second time I’d attempted polenta – and was way better than the first. But perhaps that’s obvious? Now, I’ve had the experience of eating it in a country in which it is a standard part of the cuisine.
I infused the milk and water (500ml for two people) with bay leaves, sliced garlic and some parsley) before straining the liquid and then adding 100g of polenta (the quick cook stuff) to it. Some faint sticking occurred, but that was easily dealt with. I added a little butter and some olive oil and seasoning. And – a new lesson – I actually kept tasting.
The more I think about it, the more I come to understand that good cooking is not difficult. It IS an art – or at least, cook cooking reflects an appreciation of life that goes far beyond anything puritanical.
I wonder, sometimes, just how much those tourists who visit Venice (or Barcelona or Paris or Berlin or London) on buses, and spend a meagre few hours being told what to look at and how to look at it, actually ever get from their trips.
I am not a snob. The experiences of the Orient Express taught me (if I’d not realised it before) that money has little to do with appreciation. So I want everyone who can really gain from travel to be able to do so. But I think of what Nino said and I do wonder how much of all this tourism is worth it.
It’s a subject that crops up in Donna Leon’s Guido Brunetti novels.
Back in the UK, I was surfing Amazon – so often the source of unexpected information, if only indirectly. And I found this set of crime novels – 19 to date – set in Venice.
Leon is a US-born academic, who has lived and worked in Iran, China, Saudi Arabi and, subsequently, for 20 years, Venice.
Given a rather good Amazon offer, I ordered the first three books – and am already more than half way through the second. Which should tell you something about the first. I’ve now ordered the fourth to sixth.
It’s really not that difficult to take something of a city home with you after all.
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